Instead, the World Heritage Committee -- which is meeting in Morocco next week -- is all set to grant World Heritage status to the Darjeeling Himalayan Railways, constructed by the British in 1880, partly because the proposal from the Ministry of Railways not only conformed to all the UNESCO requirements but also gave a detailed plan about protection and future development. This will be only the second railway site in the world to be given the status, the other is in Semering, Austria.

India has not had an addition to its 16 World Heritage sites since 1993 (when Humayun's Tomb and Qutub Minar in New Delhi were added) because of a singular lack of interestin the exercise on the part of ASI, which has not even sought the $15,000 preparatory assistance grant that UNESCO gives for formulating proposals.

The monuments that have lost out because of the ASI's casual approach: the 11th century Ranki Vav stepwell made by Queen Udaymati in Gujarat, Dholavira, also in Gujarat, the Bhimbetka rock shelters in Madhya Pradesh (500 of which have paintings), the monuments at Mandu, the Gwalior Fort, Sarnath, Nalanda, Sher Shah's tomb in Sarsaram, Sikandra in Agra, the temples in Bhubaneshwar, and the Warangal Fort.

This list of 11 which was dispatched by the ASI early this year directly to the World Heritage Bureau (without the intervention of UNESCO) was part of a longer list of 20 monuments which the ASI had sent in 1994. Being made a World Heritage site makes the monument the property not just of the country but also of mankind, and allows nations to seek financial and technical help through the UNESCO.

There are 582 World Heritage sites in the world.